Entrance
signals in to Mount Gambier from main line into station yard. Late
1970's.
Bottom signal is in the off position for Bluebird to enter
Millicent Dead end platform. Note: On next track over
is a low small dwarf signal for entering old goods yard, or
the station
platform travelling from the new marshalling yard and loco
depot.

Wehl street from goods outside.

Berthat Street into New Yard.

Bertha Street from New Yard.

520 class near Wehl Street 16 May 1976
Yours truly Johnny is the Shunter on 520.

520 class historical train 16 May
1976

520
leaving Mount Gambier station yard,
loco 520 on 16 May 1976

Engine
520 Departing Mount Gambier.
16 May 1976.

MOUNT
GAMBIER days near the end. 1984

Returning
to MOUNT GAMBIER. 1984

1984.
In fading light, loco 520 charging along
near/parallel to Cafpirco Road - naturally the
train
beat us to the rail crossing.

520
standing at MT GAMBIER RWS - best I
could do given
the circumstances, no tripod
and many obstacles in
the way. 1984.

Mt
Gambier 943 in 1983.
Tue & Thurs Jet
to Adelaide

950, 834, 935 522 February 1984 on "B"
road doing
the air on first part of 152,
the rest of train on
"A" Road.

950, 834, 935 522 February 1984 on "B"
road doing
the air on first part of 152

Engine
960 February 1984 heading train 152

Mt
Gambier locos 951, 943 in 1984.
943 was shunt engine and 951 about to couple
to 152 Mile End train for air test on "A"
road.

(The fellow with long sox was Guard Bob Hamilton,
acting as Assistant shunter)

Mt
Gambier locos 951, 943 in 1984.
943 was shunt engine on goods shed road and 951 now
doing the air on train 152 on "A" road.

(The fellow with cap was Supervising shunter
Ziggy Lukas) The
other fellow with long sox was Guard Bob Hamilton,
acting as Assistant shunter)

Mount
Gambier 950. Fireman Brian Perry. 1984.

Stabled
Y165 with dynometer car. 1984.

George
Dawidowicz Guard Mt Gambier
piloting Vicy engine
from station yard
to New yard. 500 class shunt
engine
can be seen in old yard.

830
shunt engine on A road doing the air for 152 goods. A
930 from the New Yard will head 152 later.
Twin Vicy "T's" on C Road just came in from
Melbourne. A 930 the overnight jet on main line from
Mile End coming in on station Platform.
Photo: Maurice Broad.

VHEY
Briquettes hopper for APCEL. 1984.

Looking
through 930 windscreen from station yard over
Bertha Street to New Yard. 1984.

Mount
Gambier Loco 931 on turntable. Note:
turntable 'half full of water' on 6th April 1992.

907
on turntable Mount Gambier.
(Bill
Towner)

966
Loco Depot MOUNT GAMBIER.

966 Loco
Depot MOUNT GAMBIER.

937
in 1983 at refuelling point in Loco

GM42
MOUNT GAMBIER. 09 March 1993.

522
shunt engine in Mt Gambier loco. 1984

935,
834, 950, 511 just came in as 547 ex Mile End in
New Yard February 1984.
The Guard is a Naracoorte Guard who would have
bought 547 in from Naracoorte.
Old yard 930 shunt engine sits on weigh bridge
waiting to pick up loading for old station yard
and goods shed.

Another
shot of 935, 834, 950, 511 just came in as 547 ex
Mile End in New Yard February 1984.
Old yard 930 shunt engine sits on weigh bridge
ready to pick up old yard loading.

In this movie above 959, 834, 935 reverse from loco in new
yard onto 152 in old station yard that was already made up
ready on "B" road near signal cabin with the
local 522 shunt engine already placed on 152
train ready to be returned shut down to Mile End as another
fresh 500 class shunt engine would have come in on 547.
That engine was showing in movie shunting in new yard near
weigh bridge from Mile End that morning would have had our
fresh 500 class shunt engine on it. This picture opposite
is 152
that same day thundering out past Wandillo.

The
pic of 931 through the Tantanoola forest
taken near
Holloways Crossing 513km post.
Driver Andy Martin on
train 2625.
6th April 1992.

931
approaching Tantanoola.
8th April 1992.

931 near Snuggery.
April 1992.

931 crossing the main Millicent road Snuggery.
8th April 1992.

Tantanoola. 08-04-1992.

Passing Tantanoola to Snuggery. April-1992.

931 at Snuggery. April 1992.

931 on the triangle at Snuggery. April 1992.

931 at Snuggery. April 1992.

Burrangule 1992

Snuggery 1992.
In the distance one can see they
starting to build an add-on at Apcel.
It has now been removed in 2012.

Snuggery 1992

Snuggery
Triangle a memory from the 1970's

There was
in the 70's - 80's two return trains a day out of Mount
Gambier to Millicent and Snuggery.

The first train departed Mount Gambier at 10:30am for Millicent and only went to Millicent and
on way back shunted the two paper mills at Cellulose Snuggery
and Apcel Tantanoola for any loading. These two paper mills
were only separated by the main Mt Gambier - Millicent
road.
When the briquettes for Apcel started
up in 80's, these were sent always out on the morning Millicent and while train
was at Millicent these briquette wagons were unloaded and then
empty wagons picked up on the return
journey and the briquette empties would go out on the 6pm Victorian
jet that evening. Note: Between 6am to 8am the morning inward Vicy would bring these briquettes
in anywhere between 6 to 12 hopper type VHEY wagons and take the empty briquette wagons back out that evening. An odd
coal wagon would often catch fire, smoking like a steam train, especially if light rain on them as the coal would catch fire
for some reason and we would have to get the local Fire Brigade to quell fire with
a lot of water, then rush the wagon out to Apcel so they could unload it straight away. Good fun.

The daytime Millicent had basically Millicent loading, plus
some super GY and OBF's for sidings on way and would go to Millicent. Single ended 930's were mostly not used on the day Millicent.
They were used on night Snuggery, but occasionally they were used in emergency
out to Millicent.
Once at Millicent they would then run
in reverse back to Cellulose, then turn the engine on triangle, also at same time shunt Cellulose for
loading on the evening jet trains, the 8:30pm Mile End
overnight jet and
mixed Passenger to Adelaide with sleeper car and the 6pm depart
Victorian jet. It would also shunt Apcel for toilet paper etc and
Tantanoola for Dolomite
bogie wagons for
evening Vicy jet. The day Millicent normally would not take
out empties for Cellulose or Apcel Mills unless urgently required, but would pickup all available loaded wagons for
both evening jets. Though in latter years the Millicent would
often take empty louver vans for Apcel, as Apcel was getting
quite busy then. Cellulose gradually became a non event.

The second train departed at 6:30pm called the "night snuggery" This took out empties as well as loading for both mills.
In earlier days Cellulose was a big concern. Big tonnages of inwards white pulp paper from Sweden for mixing in with cardboard, and
truckloads of recycled waste paper. Also boxcars of paper rolls and cardboard came out of
Cellulose using mostly the M type vans. If these wagons of paper rolls got away in a loose shunt with crook handbrake, the rolls were so heavy they would bulge out the end of the box car, fortunately
this not often happened. Cellulose was busy place till around late 70's, then Cellulose slowly closed down in early 80's
(well I think as memory fades a little now). Shunting in Cellulose was a major job to do. Remember, only hand signals and hand lamps
were used in those
earlier days, no radios. Always a guard and a station porter were booked for the late afternoon Snuggery 6:30pm departure that only went
as far as Snuggery and return.

Here is a rough rundown what went on once you got to Snuggery on that 6:30pm night train. Cellulose only had about 3, maybe 4 spur lines
(brain fade) and they were always
very near full of loaded and empty wagons. One could not swing a cat out there at
anytime and the trains were big, was near nightmare for train staff. The Triangle was very important as
train staff would take train to Snuggery, stop the GB
(Guard's Brakevan) between the two triangle points on main line, then cut off GB. The train was always marshalled in
correct shunting order before departure from the Mount and it was only a matter of first pushing the whole train completely into Cellulose
(was a big place with a long track fortunately) and
first couple to the loaded box cars often 20 or 30 of them, throw the points
in front of engine and pull
whole train back out onto mainline out over the Main
Millicent - Mt Gambier highway with engine now facing the Mt Gambier direction. It was usually a
very long string by then.
A crossing signal later had to be installed right at the Millicent
highway crossing so the train could pull right up to highway
road crossing and not set off the crossing gongs and lights.
A button was installed at crossing and also in the Train Control box
in the Snuggery siding about middle of the triangle mainline
switchstands. Then push the loaded box cars back onto the GB on main line. Then go
and place the empty box cars, remember you still got the
whole train with long string of empties and loaded pulp paper and some Apcel
empties for later as well.

All hand signals or should I say in earlier days a hand kerosene
lamp as the shunting out there was at night, later
replaced with battery hand lamps with a long track curve into the cardboard loading dock and normally was
reasonably easy to see engineman. Trouble was there was always high packs of recycle cardboard bales and white pulp heaps stacked close to
track blocking off the view of driver. The porter most times had to climb on top of the paper stacks so he could see the guard and engineman at same
time to relay the hand signals. It was often hair raising stuff, also chucked into it was
raining and windy at times. Miserable weather and in middle
of the night. Remember also, this is the South East where
"it rains 11 months of the year and drips off the trees the rest of the
year", but
of course not so much these last few latter years. The hardest part was not to smash into the dead end inside the cellulose building with the long strings. The dead end was built pretty solid, so it would stop
a string of wagons near dead, or damage the coupling on M type vans. Also that would slam the engine crew hard back into their seats, not good on the old neck.
Was a good reason to keep
awake and to be very vigilant for hand or lamp signals. Also
drivers
have different habits, so you on the ground had to learn
these driving habits quickly. When two way radios finally came in mid 1980’s it was pure bliss. The main part
out there was not to get runover.

Then you picked up the empty white paper OB's and those long car container wagons etc that had been used for waste recycle cardboard from Mile End, place them on main line with the loaded paper roll
M type boxcar wagons. Now you could place all the loaded waste paper wagons and white OB pulp paper onto
separate roads, then finally back onto the train, couple up
all air
hoses and do the air test and write up wagon numbers and tonnages as you were now done with Cellulose. The
most worse part now over.

But that's not all, you still had all of Apcel's empty VLX type vans
on the front with OBF's of soda ash next to engine. It was now just a matter of
pressing the
crossing signal button to set off the Millicent Highway crossing gongs and
wait for the green light, then pulling the whole train out over the Millicent
Highway crossing till train just clear and go to work shunting Apcel nearly same
again, but not as much clear track at Apcel. Pull out the loaded VLX type vans and empty
soda ash OBF's and place the empties and inward loaded soda ash.
Also on the way back to Mount there were empty GY’s, OBF’s
and Dolimite to pickup at sidings like
Tantanoola, Marte. Then get back to Mount around 4am or 5am if your
were lucky just in time for the morning 5am shunt crew books
on to then pull your train to bits. Any
Mile End loading out of Snuggery would go out on 152 the
daytime roadside train to Tailem Bend, thence Mile End.

But then this story does have a very sad ending, that big bad wolf A.N. came along in sheep's clothing and huffed and puffed and
slowly trashed it all, so only thing left is a sad slow
death rail ending
for the South East and that Cellulose triangle is now no
more in 2007, the final ending to an interesting SAR rail era. Glad I was
very fortunate to have
worked and lived through part of that time and can still remember
those good and busy old rail days.

931 from Snuggery into Tantanoola.
Apcel Mills on horizon.
April 1992.

405
at Cellulose Snuggery August 1997
Just unloaded off transporter for LCR.

8th
April 1992
MILLICENT Rail yard.

8th
April 1992
MILLICENT Rail yard.

July 2012Looks like the rails at Millicent will be pulled up and
removed.
The unused track will then stop at Apcel before the main Mt
Gambier - Millicent xing.
At least the station is being look after and put to good
use.

Note:
All lower quadrant signals were all lit by
Kerosene lamps. These lamps were filled and wicks
trimmed twice a week. The Junction and Station
cabins had the LQ signals and switch rodding all
dis-connected and pulled out in late 1980's along
with electric staff instruments.
Train Order working was then instituted.